Most powerful computer possible for a reasonable price

[Dinkydau]

Got the motherboard:

[ker2x]

Ho you got a dual socket

Could you please, if you don't mind, the details of your shopping CPU/MB ? reference and price (or a website link).
I considered a dual socket too but it need superexpensive Xeon 

[Dinkydau]

I bought the motherboard here:
http://www.4launch.nl/shop/#p-4-productid-093441
It's the version with the T at the end of the vendorcode, not the Z as stated on the website. I contacted 4launch about this first, so I've now got the version with the T which has the latest bios to support the opteron 6272 CPUs. If you want this motherboard as well, make sure it's either updated, or the newer T-version, if you want 6200 series opteron CPUs.

I'm still waiting for the CPUs. Ordered them at TBIT, a small company in Dongen that doesn't list products on a website, have to contact by e-mail. It's very professional though. They're costing me €545 each now, which is above average. Cheapest in the Netherlands is €500, but it's far away, and train tickets are expensive too. Plus the idea of having to go all the way back if something's wrong, I prefer buying close by.

[ker2x]

I bought the motherboard here:
http://www.4launch.nl/shop/#p-4-productid-093441
It's the version with the T at the end of the vendorcode, not the Z as stated on the website. I contacted 4launch about this first, so I've now got the version with the T which has the latest bios to support the opteron 6272 CPUs. If you want this motherboard as well, make sure it's either updated, or the newer T-version, if you want 6200 series opteron CPUs.

I'm still waiting for the CPUs. Ordered them at TBIT, a small company in Dongen that doesn't list products on a website, have to contact by e-mail. It's very professional though. They're costing me €545 each now, which is above average. Cheapest in the Netherlands is €500, but it's far away, and train tickets are expensive too. Plus the idea of having to go all the way back if something's wrong, I prefer buying close by.

Haaaaaaa AMD. 
I understand now 

[stardust4ever]

Nice! It would probably cost a small fortune as well to populate all of those RAM slots. Or why you would really need 14 SATA ports unles you've got massively redundant RAID hard drive arrays, for that matter. Now throw in a quad cross-fire setup with four PCI-Express 16x graphics adapters for maximum CUDA processing potential and gaming overload...

It may also be difficult finding a PSU with two 8-pin +12 power plugs. How many watts will you need? Also, have you decided on a case for that monster yet?

Be sue to post some picks of the system internals when you've got everything set up.

[Dinkydau]

Yes, the corsair ax750 has 2× 8-pin connectors for the motherboard. I paid attention to that. Oh, I see the list of components in the startpost is a little outdated. Here's an update:

Old:

Code:

motherboard: Asus KGPE-D16, 2× g34 socket, Extended-ATX, costs about €450 here (Netherlands)
CPU: 2× AMD Opteron 6272, 16-core, 2 - 3 GHz (depending on load and settings), cost at least over €500
RAM: 4× 4096 MB, no particular brand I prefer yet
GPU: (my current) nVidia 8800 GTS, 512 MB
storage: (current HDDs) 250 GB, 750 GB
sound card:
cooler:
power supply:
case:

Now:

Code:

motherboard: Asus KGPE-D16, 2× g34 socket, Extended-ATX, €430
CPU: 2× AMD Opteron 6272, 16-core, 2 - 3 GHz (depending on load and settings), €545
RAM: 8× Kingston 2048 MB 1333 MHz (4× 4GB kits)
GPU: (my current) nVidia 8800 GTS, 512 MB
storage: (current HDDs) 250 GB, 750 GB
sound card: still undecided
cooler: 2× Noctua nh-09DO a3, €74
power supply: Corsair ax750, 750 watt, Gold, €147
case: Cooler master HAF932, €135

About the case: it supports EATX form factor, but not SSI EEB, which this motherboard is. I've tried to find SSI EEB cases but they're extremely rare. I'm still a little undecided here. I'm afraid the affordable server cases that support EEB don't have the high quality air flow that this cooler master case has. The HAF932 is also very silent. On other websites I see veryone installing EEB motherboard sin EATX cases for some reason. Some crews can be applied, but not all. It appears to work, usually.

[Dinkydau]

And there we have the most important of all components.

The sound card!

[stardust4ever]

And there we have the most important of all components.

The sound card!

What, your motherboard doesn't have integrated sound? Soundblaster Audigy's are the best btw. I used to have one of the originals from back in 2001.

[Dinkydau]

Apparently not, probably because it's a "server" motherboard. I'm gonna take the risk with this cheap card (€20), and if it's crap, I'll buy something better.

[PhotoComix]

any update ?

[stardust4ever]

Dinkydau, have you finished assembling your system? I realized I had forgotten about this thread and I wondered if you ever got the system up and running. I recently finished a render job that took over three weeks, so i now it's been a while. Can't wait to see the benchmarks...

[Dinkydau]

The CPUs took very long to arrive, and then it appeard some stupid awesome dude sent the wrong coolers. I really hope it won't take much longer now.

[stardust4ever]

The CPUs took very long to arrive, and then it appeard some stupid awesome dude sent the wrong coolers. I really hope it won't take much longer now.

Bah! RMAs suck, but you gotta do what you gotta do. I can only recall once that I've ever had to RMA something, where the experience actually turned out positive.

When I ordered the parts for my barebones laptop back in 2006, they sent me the wrong version of the Intel wireless adapter. Apparently, there were two different versions that fit different sized expansion slots. My computer needed the newer type slot, but they sent me the older version. The guys sent me an RMA number right away. They told me if had time, they would ship me the correct part at no cost once they received the old incorrect one, or if I was in a hurry, I could order the correct part immediately if I wanted, and they would refund the price of the incorrect part plus shipping when they received it back (both parts were the same price). I forget the company, but they had excellent customer service. I opted to order the new part ASAP and wait for a refund on the old one, since I needed the laptop before school started. They knew I needed it fast, so they gave me a voucher for free expedited shipping on the new part! I forget the name of the company now, but excellent customer service.

It seems like the company you are dealing with is lazy. I wish you luck resolving your issues...

[Dinkydau]

The computer is up and running. I ran the benchmark test with the big X and it finished in 82 seconds. I'll quote some information from before:

Your time: 2 * 60 + 48 = 168 seconds
My time: 7 * 60 + 35 = 455 seconds
That's with overclock on your processor, a very nice speed-up.

With 4stardust's CPU overclocked and mine not (2× opteron 6272 @ 2,1 GHz), these are the results:

455/82 = 5,55 times faster than my old computer
168/82 = 2,05 times faster than 4stardust's overclocked fx-8150

This is interesting, because it was expected that based on information about the architecture, it would be 2 times faster, and it almost exactly is indeed.

I've also ran IntprecPerf:

Code:

Running tests on 32 thread system.
Performance with 1 threads is 0.546 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 2 threads is 1.090 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 3 threads is 1.551 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 4 threads is 1.910 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 5 threads is 2.331 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 6 threads is 2.644 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 7 threads is 3.220 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 8 threads is 3.578 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 9 threads is 4.004 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 10 threads is 4.445 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 11 threads is 4.787 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 12 threads is 5.327 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 13 threads is 5.714 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 14 threads is 5.920 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 15 threads is 6.330 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 16 threads is 6.679 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 17 threads is 7.173 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 18 threads is 7.535 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 19 threads is 8.169 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 20 threads is 8.325 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 21 threads is 8.563 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 22 threads is 9.410 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 23 threads is 9.151 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 24 threads is 9.894 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 25 threads is 10.137 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 26 threads is 10.538 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 27 threads is 10.966 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 28 threads is 11.321 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 29 threads is 11.674 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 30 threads is 12.003 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 31 threads is 12.396 GBlocks/sec
Performance with 32 threads is 12.724 GBlocks/sec

This confirms the 2,05 as well, as it's slightly more than 2 times more blocks blocks than the 6,009 from 4stardust.

Also, yes, we can now be sure: Fractal eXtreme works with 2 physical CPUs.

My CPUs didn't turboboost to 2,4 GHz during the tests and I don't know why. They should be able to. I'm going to see if I can find out more about that.

You'll probably want pictures. I have some.












More details of this window:
http://i538.photobucket.com/albums/ff342/formule/32cores.png

[stardust4ever]

That is very nice. Tons of fans LOL! Does your computer sound like a race car engine, or are they throttled? With all of those giant fans, it should be possible at least to run the external fans at 5V and keep everything cool. And the motherboard should be able to throttle the CPU fans if they are 4-pin smart type. What size are your CPU cooler fans? They've got a similar tower design compared to my CPU cooler, but mine's only got one 92mm fan on it though it could easily accommodate two.

One-half the speed with four times the cores equals twice the muscle. Your big rig PC can haul more @$$ than my sports car PC can. It's a shame you can't overclock an Opteron processor though. I'd imagine that the cores are capable enough to go up to at least to 3Ghz without instability. Like I said before, I run mine on max turbo, but I guess yours would be like running the engine at red-line continuously: you'll need a seriously big radiator to keep it from overheating!